Dana White Confirms Silva-Sonnen II Almost Didn’t Happen

Rumors of UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva not agreeing to fight Chael Sonnen were shot down by UFC president Dana White when they started to rumble around social media sites earlier this year.

However, during a recent interview with MMAjunkie.com, White confirmed that those “false” rumors were indeed true. Silva wasn’t going to sign to face Sonnen, even as White and Sonnen boarded a plane for a press conference to announce the fight in Brazil.

“When we did the press conference down in Brazil, Silva hadn’t even agreed to fight him,” White said. “That fight wasn’t happening. I had them bring Anderson to the place where the press conference was, and we sat in a room for three hours fighting about the fight.”

White added that Silva didn’t want to fight Sonnen because he’s disrespectful “and doesn’t deserve a shot at this title at all.”

Well, White did get Silva to agree and the two rivals are set to square off this Saturday night in the main event of UFC 148: Silva vs. Sonnen II from Las Vegas. FightLine will have complete coverage of the entire event.